A nine-year-old has been bitten by a shark in Florida.
Austin Moore, of Neptune Beach, was vacationing with his family at New Smyrna Beach during the Labor Day weekend.
The young man was standing in chest-deep water on a sandbar south of Mary McLeod Bethune Beach Park, when he felt something grab his foot.
“I felt something grab me, so I turned around,” he told Action News Jax. “I thought it was my uncle trying to scare [me] and I turned around and was surprised not to see anyone.”
That’s when he saw blood in the water and realized what had happened. He started screaming and headed to shore.
The bite had left 1-inch deep puncture wounds to his right foot, along with bone-deep tear to his shin and his tendons were damaged.
He was taken to the Halifax Health in Daytona Beach, where surgeons spent two hours repairing two tendons along with sewing up the various lacerations.
Family members asked the doctor how many stitches were needed and were told “A lot.”
Moore’s foot will be bandaged for a few weeks and he is taking it in stride. He said “I’m lucky because I still have my foot.”
The incident hasn’t put Moore of sharks either. He still has a fiberglass replica of a black tip shark hanging over his bed.
While the species of shark has not been identified, black tips have been involved in several shark bites in New Smyrna Beach.
However, just last week a surfer was bitten by a bull shark in the same general area. Sam Cumiskey was surfing at Ponce Inlet when he stepped off his board and onto a large bull shark.
The 25-year-old had four tendons severed, but as with Moore, is thankful his foot is still intact.
There have been a total of sixty shark attacks bites in 2016. Six of which were fatal. Twenty-seven reported in the US, with eighteen occurring in Florida. Eleven have occurred in Australia, three of which were fatal.
All locations have been marked on the 2016 shark attack bites tracking map.
